SRI Threads: Vintage Japanese and Indian Textiles

A Rustic Indigo Dyed Boro Nagagi: Beautiful Patches, Eccentric Stitching

Sri is a textile gallery specializing in antique Japanese folk textiles, highlighting the indigo-dyed cotton utilitarian fabrics and boro--or patched and mended--textiles of old Japan. We also carry a wonderful selection of textiles from India.

We are located in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, New York and we are open by appointment.

Please visit our BLOG, Sri Threads, for our commentary on the world of Japanese folk textiles and for photographs of our New York home.

If you would like to visit us, please do not hesitate to e mail or call us; we would love to meet you.

As well, if you are searching for a specific type of textile not listed on our site, feel free to contact us with your request. Our showroom inventory is larger and more diverse than we can list on this site, and we would be happy to speak to you about your interest and how we might help you find the textile you are looking for.

For a glimpse of individual pieces from our collection of specialized texiles, visit out gallery at asianart.com

And for a view into Sri's showroom, have a look at our online gallery where we have posted a few photos of our Brooklyn home.

An Applique Ralli Quilt: Boro, Indian Style

Rayela Art Molas

Click on the mola to see current Rayela Art molas on Etsy. Stock normally includes $9 molitas, a large selection of $30-$45 molas and a few more expensive ones.

Mola Books on Amazon

Do you own or have you seen any of these? Give us your opinions or other suggestions by leaving a comment.

Travel Channel on the Kuna People

The Travel Channel visits the Kuna and explores a bit of its social structure. Also, shows footage of women making molas.

Kuna Yala Montage, San Blas Islands, Panama

Video of Kuna village life with quite a few shots of mola making. No narrative- set to flute playing.

Biblical Molas at Heart of Healing Gallery

Jesus on the Cross

Heart of Healing Gallery

Heart of Healing Gallery has a huge collection of Biblical molas and other high quality molas and mola blouses. Individual Kuna artists are given recognition.

Panart: Dedicated to the Artisans of Panama

A Kuna woman who supplies Panart with molas.

From their site:

Indigenous Artisans of Panamá:
Emberá, Wounaan, Kuna, Ngobe-Bugle

Panamá has a diverse and culturally rich Indigenous population which accounts for approximately 8 percent of the total population.
Although threatened by environmental degradation of their lands and incursions by outside groups, the tribal people of Panamá have managed to preserve much of their culture and traditions. They are engaged in a ongoing struggle to have their homelands legally recognized and the boundaries respected.

Crafts for sale to outsiders have developed from the traditional material culture and now help maintain tribal identity as well as provide a supplemental means of support when people can no longer depend completely on a traditional lifestyle.

Pattern for Bug Mola

Instructions and pattern by Charlotte Patera.

Mola Instructions by Thorup

Instructions on how to make a mola by Sherry Thorup.